Today I got up early to decorate the breakfast table with chicks and bunnies and everyone got their own Easter Egg and a hand-painted card from me. What do you and your children do at Easter? Sometimes it can seem a bit of an effort to celebrate over the holiday period, when you are imagining all those “perfect” families doing the traditional things and here you are, a single mum who has to think up all the festivities and put in extra effort all by yourself to keep everything happy and rosy. In this extract from the book we look at building family traditions and creating those memories for your child to look back on.

Kayleigh ….now I always have my camera or my phone and you get to look back and relive those memories. So now with my grandson, I’m making sure that my son and I are taking lots of pictures so I’m passing that down too. When my son got a little bit older we would go out to breakfast on a couple of Saturday each month and he would have to put all these quarters into the machine to get the toy, and that was a little tradition. Christmas was always with my family so we’d get in the car the night before and he’d have the same tradition that I had growing up, so the room with the Christmas tree in would be closed off and Santa would be in there with the cookies and the glass of milk and he wouldn’t be able to see until we were all up and they would draw the curtain back to the family room and then we would all go in. At Easter he would colour in his Easter egg and then he’d have to go look for his Easter basket, so those were some of the holiday traditions that we had.
You, too, can become the keeper of the family heritage. However tiring it is to do all this yourself, building family traditions for you and your child will ensure that you both have a treasure box of memories to delight in. Rituals and traditions are such a huge part of every culture and a great source of comfort and joy for people of all ages. Life may not have turned out as you expected, you may not have a conventional family (whatever that may be these days) but you can start creating that rich and colourful family history, those wonderful family traditions right where you are now. You’ll be glad you did, and so will your child. And don’t forget to make a record of it in some way. The photos or videos will bring it all back and provide a talking point for years to come.

“THE SINGLE MUM’S SURVIVAL GUIDE – How To Pick Up The Pieces and Build a Happy New Life” is available to order now from Amazon.